The Many Japans I’ve Known
I have been to Japan several times, and strangely enough, I have never really been to the same Japan twice.
The country has remained remarkably itself. I am the one who kept changing.
My first visit was when I was 27, travelling with three university friends, very little money and a great deal of enthusiasm. It was only my second trip to Asia and the first stop of what would become an eleven-month round-the-world journey.
This was before Google Translate could instantly tell you what a sign meant, before every tiny restaurant had hundreds of reviews online, before you could watch a YouTube video of virtually every street corner in the world. We collected information wherever we could find it: a travel agency, a few international magazines, some Japanese websites we could barely understand. But, to be honest, we were young. We didn't need much information. We had plane tickets.
We booked a ryokan in Asakusa that was recommended in a Lonely Planet guide, mostly because it was one of the cheapest options we could find, and decided that since Japan was going to be expensive, we would keep things simple: Tokyo, Kyoto and Osaka.
Tokyo completely fascinated me.
The order. The silence within the crowds. The skyscrapers. The architecture. The way people dressed. Everything seemed both incredibly modern and deeply rooted in tradition.
On our second day, the thermo we used for our "mate" broke. This was a serious problem for four Uruguayans travelling around the world.
We began looking for a replacement.
Somehow, while walking around Tokyo, we spotted a large sign outside an office with the word “THERMO” on it. We were convinced we had found our solution. Four excited Latin Americans knocked on the door and tried to explain, in a mixture of Spanish, English, gestures and the repeated word “thermo,” what we wanted.
The person who opened the door probably had absolutely no idea what was happening.
But the Japanese are extraordinarily polite. Instead of sending us away, they invited us into a conference room, where someone proceeded to explain something to us in Japanese in front of a whiteboard.
We had no idea what he was saying.
We didn't want to interrupt.
There was no translator to save us.
Eventually, we resorted to drawing a picture of a thermos.
We still didn't get one.
We walked everywhere, day and night. We ate in restaurants by choosing places where we could see plastic replicas of the dishes outside and, preferably, a queue of Japanese people waiting to get in. At night, we got drunk and wild in the bars and clubs of Roppongi.
And we discovered another thing about Japan: if you asked someone for directions, they didn't simply point you in the right direction.
They took you there.
We would stop someone, show them a card with an address written in Japanese, and that person would often abandon whatever they were doing and walk us to the entrance. On one occasion, a woman actually got on the train with us to make sure we arrived at the right place (the one in the picture).
Everything was fascinating: the food, the temples and shrines, taking your shoes off before entering places, the architecture, the lanterns appearing as evening fell.
And, at 27, I also discovered something else I found particularly fascinating about Japan: Japanese men.
There was a combination of confidence, restraint and aesthetic awareness that I had never encountered before.
So I made a decision.
I wanted a Japanese boyfriend.
A few days later, Kyoto welcomed us with cherry blossoms. It was early April, and the city looked almost unreal. Geishas walking through the streets, traditional architecture, lanterns glowing at dusk.
One rainy afternoon, we went to one of the gardens because, with only a few days in the city, we couldn't afford to waste time because of the weather. We were amazed to see Japanese people having picnics in the rain, sitting on plastic sheets as if this were perfectly normal.
Among them was an American English teacher who invited us to join.
So there we were: four Uruguayans,an American and a bunch of Japanese, sitting under the rain under umbrellas, having a picnic in Kyoto.
It was perfect.
Pic nic under the rain Kyoto 2007 Pic nic under the rain Kyoto 2007 Geishas Kyoto 2007
The following year, life took me to Dubai.
I had been hired by a Japanese restaurant that had been born in London and was, apparently, quite famous in England. I had never heard of it. I simply wanted to live abroad, and this was an opportunity.
I arrived in July 2008, months before the restaurant opened, and spent eight hours a day training until October.
I learned an enormous amount about Japanese food, ingredients, techniques and culture, despite working at the restaurant’s reception desk.
And somewhere among more than 200 employees, I fell hopelessly in love with the only Japanese man working there.
He was a sushi chef. Not particularly tall, not particularly friendly, and with very little English.
But watching him work was mesmerizing.
The concentration. The precision. The way he handled the knife, prepared the fish and assembled a dish with an almost meditative attention.
Apparently, my 27-year-old prediction had been quite specific.
This time, I went back to Japan with my Japanese boyfriend — or, as I liked to call him at the time, my future husband.
We travelled in February, around his birthday, so that I could meet his family.
Tokyo came first, naturally.
We booked a nice hotel in Ginza. Later we met his aunt and cousin and went to some of the city's most famous restaurants. Being a chef, he was extremely particular about food. I, on the other hand, could eat almost anything.
After several days of restaurants and feeding my future husband, we travelled to Matsuyama, where his family lived.
His parents, sister, brother-in-law and nephew welcomed me warmly and made me feel completely at home.
There was only one small problem.
They spoke no English.
My Japanese was approximately that of a three-year-old.
So we communicated through the universal language of gestures, smiles and facial expressions.
In Matsuyama, my boyfriend took me around the surrounding countryside. In one small mountain town, we went to a local restaurant where he had once worked.
It was one of those tiny family-run restaurants where the chef has devoted an entire lifetime to perfecting a handful of dishes.
I remember the warmth of the place.
And the food.
It was exquisite.
Years passed before I returned to Japan.
By then, I was travelling differently.
And I was travelling alone.
In 2023, I finally went back.
I had a Uruguayan friend living near Nagano with her Japanese husband, and she had been inviting me to visit for years. Japan had also, for the first time in my lifetime, become surprisingly affordable for foreigners.
So I went.
I landed in Tokyo during a typhoon. It was already getting dark and raining heavily. I took the shuttle to Shinjuku and then a bus to Nagano, where my friends were waiting for me.
They lived in Nakano, in a beautiful traditional two-storey Japanese house they had restored and decorated with extraordinary taste.
The next morning, my friend — who works as a tour guide — became my personal guide to the region.
This was a completely different way of discovering Japan.
Everywhere we went, her knowledge and passion for Japanese culture transformed what I was seeing.
Jigokudani Park, Nagano 2023 Jigokudani Park, Nagano 2023 Jigokudani Park, Nagano 2023 Nozawaonsen 2023 Nozawaonsen 2023 Nozawaonsen 2023
We visited the famous snow monkeys bathing in the onsen, and she told me the story of how they had gradually become a tourist attraction. We watched them swimming and playing, some of them carrying their newborn babies.
She also has a deep knowledge of Japanese art, so she took me to the Hokusai Museum and told me stories I would never have discovered on my own.
Those days around Nagano were extraordinary precisely because I was travelling with someone who knew the place intimately.
One day we drove to Niigata while her husband had business there. He went to work, and we took the car and went exploring.
We somehow ended up having a matcha tea ceremony inside a museum surrounded by a spectacular garden, with virtually no tourists around.
It felt like we had discovered a secret.
After Nagano, my friend suggested taking a road trip to Matsumoto, where I could catch a bus to Kyoto.
Matsumoto immediately charmed me: compact, walkable and full of the kind of small Japanese shops and streets that make you want to slow down. We also visited the city's art museum, where there was an exhibition by Yayoi Kusama.
Matsumoto, Nagano 2023 Matsumoto, Nagano 2023 Matsumoto, Nagano 2023
Then came Kyoto.
Twenty years after my first visit, I was back.
I barely stopped moving during those four days. I started early, walked until late and tried to absorb as much as possible.
Fortunately, Kyoto had not yet become overwhelmed by tourists. Perhaps the cherry blossom season had already passed, and the crowds were concentrated elsewhere.
This time, I discovered Arashiyama.
Of all the places I had seen in Japan, it was perhaps the only one where I could imagine myself living: the river, the vegetation, the quietness.
Arashiyama, Kyoto 2023 Arashiyama, Kyoto 2023 Arashiyama, Kyoto 2023
And, naturally, being a tea lover, I couldn't resist going to Wazuka.
It took two buses to get there. I rented an electric bicycle and spent the day cycling through rolling tea fields, tasting different varieties of gyokuro and tencha.
Wazuka, Kyoto 2023 Wazuka, Kyoto 2023 Wazuka, Kyoto 2023
It was one of those days when the journey itself becomes the destination.
From Kyoto, I returned to Tokyo. This time, I booked a hotel in Shinjuku because I like exploring different neighbourhoods.
As the organised Virgo that I am, I had prepared a daily itinerary, divided by neighbourhood. I had five nights and a long list of things I wanted to see.
Those five nights felt like a month.
I walked through neighbourhood after neighbourhood, visited museums, explored design shops, drank coffee in countless cafés and stopped to look at the façades of architects whose work I admired.
Tokyo 2023 Tokyo 2023 Tokyo 2023
At the time, I had my own café in Uruguay, so coffee shops were both a pleasure and a source of research.
But the biggest difference was that I was alone.
I could walk when I wanted, stop when I wanted, spend two hours looking at one building if I felt like it, or sit in a café and simply watch people.
For the first time, I wasn't following anyone else's rhythm.
I was following mine.
I flew from Tokyo to China to spend time at a Kung Fu school, and three months later I returned to Tokyo to catch my flight home.
Those final days felt different again. I stayed in Ueno, right next to the park.
On my friend's recommendation, I visited Kamakura and Enoshima. I walked through forests, discovering temples and shrines along the way.
Kamakura 2023 Kamakura 2023 Kamakura 2023
I also deliberately wandered into neighbourhoods I had never heard of.
Sometimes I didn't do anything at all.
I simply sat somewhere and watched.
Like a fixed camera.
I've always liked combining movement with stillness when I travel.
Perhaps that is one of the reasons Japan suits me so well.
My most recent visit was in November 2025.
It was far too short, but somehow incredibly beautiful.
I was travelling from China to Korea, and my flight had a stopover in Osaka. So I decided to stay for two nights.
And, because life is full of lovely coincidences, my friend from Nagano happened to be leading a tour nearby.
Together with Ceci, my business partner and travel companion, we arranged to meet the three of us in Nara.
We arrived in Osaka in the afternoon. Ceci, who was staying longer, sent her luggage ahead to her final hotel in Tokyo, and we took the train to Nara.
Fifteen minutes later, our friend arrived.
After a quick shower, we went out for dinner.
It was already dark and the streets were almost empty. Afterwards, we walked through the park and spotted a few deer sleeping in little piles.
The next morning was the real surprise.
We wanted to start early, before the tour groups arrived. And having the best possible guide with us, we knew exactly where to go.
We could hardly believe our eyes.
There were deer everywhere.
The autumn colours were spectacular. In fact, for me, they surpassed the cherry blossoms I had admired on my first trip.
We spent the day enjoying momijigari — the Japanese tradition of appreciating the autumn foliage — visiting temples and gardens, eating and laughing together.
Nara 2025 Nara 2025 Nara 2025
That evening, I returned to Osaka, where I spent my final hours wandering the city and eating street food.
And then, once again, Japan was over.
Too short this time.
Almost teasingly short.
I've sometimes wondered what it is about Japan that keeps bringing me back.
Maybe it is the obvious things: the food, architecture, gardens, tea, design, temples, craftsmanship and extraordinary attention to detail.
But I think it is something else.
Every time I have returned, I have been a different traveller.
At 27, I was fascinated by everything because everything was new. I was travelling with friends, with little money and almost no information.
The second time, I was in love. Japan wasn't just a destination anymore. It was someone's home, someone's family, someone's childhood.
In 2023, I travelled alone. I looked at Japan through the eyes of a entrepreneur, a coffee lover, a tea enthusiast and someone increasingly interested in architecture, art and design. I had the freedom to choose exactly what I wanted to see — and what I didn't.
And in 2025, Japan became something much simpler: two days, old friends, autumn leaves, deer, temples, laughter and good food.
Perhaps that is why I don't think I'll ever be finished with Japan.
There are still so many places I haven't seen.
So many small towns.
So many tea fields.
So many local restaurants where I don't know the name of the chef.
And, fortunately, my friend in Nagano is still there.
I have a feeling Japan and I are not finished with each other yet.
Comments